Hi there,
So I have had a little of an awakening, actually. Not only have I come to the conclusion that you can't save yourself, unless you have first obeyed; but I have come to the realisation, that the state you are in when you commit your obedience to God, matters to God. Let me explain what I mean.
God has a choice, and that choice is whether to create unconsciously, by allowing things to be or to create consciously, by directing things. Now you might say "well, why does He not always create consciously, then He would know where what He has created has ended up?" But actually if God created consciously all the time, everything He created would be afraid of doing the wrong thing. "Ok," you say "But how does God create, if He creates unconsciously? If there is no answer in God, surely what He created would die?" And indeed you have hit on the truth, unless God becomes conscious of what He has created unconsciously, it will die - perhaps only spiritually, but it will die (all the same).
The point is, concerning this last statement, is that the Devil is lying when He says "God will only ever keep killing you"; it is not God's desire that He create something so unconscious it never lives. The choice as to whether to live or die in the Spirit, is Christ Jesus' choice - Jesus' messenger shares that choice with the world and the world is free to be spirited or not, as it sees fit. If the world counts consciousness for unconsciousness, the spirit will seem little; if those in the world count unconsciousness for consciousness, they will be translated into consciousness, in Heaven. The thing we should realise here, is that God cares what that distinction is: is it consciousness, or is it unconsciousness?
Now we suffer in this life, because we confuse these two things; we think "God doesn't care whether I am conscious or unconscious, I will do my own thing!" How great a mistake this is. For the time is coming when God will hold us to account, what did we do with our consciousness and what did we do despite our unconsciousness? This is because Christ comes to consciousness in God. We are accountable to the Son, whether we praise God now or in eternity. The Devil may puff up with pride, that he gives a song of his own praise to Man and is not struck down, but the time is coming when he will be judged - it will matter in that day, whether he says "I was ignorant of the lie" or "I only lied so much", in both cases he will be judged.
The struggle we have today, on Earth, is that we both know the choice and are responsible for our part as to whether those with us are aware of the choice also. "My brother can make up his own mind" is not an excuse, even if all we do is pray, we have done something and it will be required of us. The whole question of "is there a God?" is actually wrapped up in a greater question "how conscious are we of what God has created in us?" for God will consciously bring it to account! The root of it starts and ends in Christ, but do not be fooled: Christ is not unconscious of anything God has created through Him. Christ will bear witness to everything, whether it was reluctantly conscious or deliberately unconscious.
I hope this has been of some encouragement.
God bless.
So I have had a little of an awakening, actually. Not only have I come to the conclusion that you can't save yourself, unless you have first obeyed; but I have come to the realisation, that the state you are in when you commit your obedience to God, matters to God. Let me explain what I mean.
God has a choice, and that choice is whether to create unconsciously, by allowing things to be or to create consciously, by directing things. Now you might say "well, why does He not always create consciously, then He would know where what He has created has ended up?" But actually if God created consciously all the time, everything He created would be afraid of doing the wrong thing. "Ok," you say "But how does God create, if He creates unconsciously? If there is no answer in God, surely what He created would die?" And indeed you have hit on the truth, unless God becomes conscious of what He has created unconsciously, it will die - perhaps only spiritually, but it will die (all the same).
The point is, concerning this last statement, is that the Devil is lying when He says "God will only ever keep killing you"; it is not God's desire that He create something so unconscious it never lives. The choice as to whether to live or die in the Spirit, is Christ Jesus' choice - Jesus' messenger shares that choice with the world and the world is free to be spirited or not, as it sees fit. If the world counts consciousness for unconsciousness, the spirit will seem little; if those in the world count unconsciousness for consciousness, they will be translated into consciousness, in Heaven. The thing we should realise here, is that God cares what that distinction is: is it consciousness, or is it unconsciousness?
Now we suffer in this life, because we confuse these two things; we think "God doesn't care whether I am conscious or unconscious, I will do my own thing!" How great a mistake this is. For the time is coming when God will hold us to account, what did we do with our consciousness and what did we do despite our unconsciousness? This is because Christ comes to consciousness in God. We are accountable to the Son, whether we praise God now or in eternity. The Devil may puff up with pride, that he gives a song of his own praise to Man and is not struck down, but the time is coming when he will be judged - it will matter in that day, whether he says "I was ignorant of the lie" or "I only lied so much", in both cases he will be judged.
The struggle we have today, on Earth, is that we both know the choice and are responsible for our part as to whether those with us are aware of the choice also. "My brother can make up his own mind" is not an excuse, even if all we do is pray, we have done something and it will be required of us. The whole question of "is there a God?" is actually wrapped up in a greater question "how conscious are we of what God has created in us?" for God will consciously bring it to account! The root of it starts and ends in Christ, but do not be fooled: Christ is not unconscious of anything God has created through Him. Christ will bear witness to everything, whether it was reluctantly conscious or deliberately unconscious.
I hope this has been of some encouragement.
God bless.
